Kate Barutha, 29, began volunteering with the Midwest Access Coalition after the 2016 election. She provides a bed, home-cooked meals and emotional support to people traveling to Chicago for abortion care. (Sebastián Hidalgo)

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Since its founding in 2014, the Midwest Access Coalition has served more than 215 people from 14 states and has never turned away a request.

CHICAGO—Once a month, Morgan Malone prepares to host a stranger in her South Side home. She consults a thorough email about her guest’s needs, shops for snacks and cooks meals. She checks that there are clean sheets on the guest bed, a journal and plenty of sanitary pads. Her guest is traveling to Chicago for an abortion.

When a friend sent her a link to the Midwest Access Coalition and asked her to come to a volunteer information session, Malone—an extremely social Black woman who has performed in the Vagina Monologues and advocated against female genital mutilation—did not think twice. She quickly joined 90 other volunteers who create a warm and loving environment of support.

According to the Guttmacher Institute, 90 percent of counties in the United States in 2014 did not have a single clinic providing abortions. This means that many people seeking to terminate a pregnancy must travel, often to a large city like Chicago.

Illinois also sits in the middle of a doughnut of restrictive Midwestern abortion laws. Iowa, Indiana and Wisconsin ban abortion after 20 weeks, while Illinois uses the more flexible standard of whether a fetus can survive outside the womb. Indiana, Wisconsin, Missouri, Michigan and Kentucky require ultrasounds and state-directed counseling, which Illinois does not. In Indiana, the counseling must be done in person at least 18 hours prior to the procedure, necessitating two trips to the doctor.

Traveling to Chicago is a way to avoid these burdensome processes. The Midwest Access Coalition assists with housing, transportation and other necessities often not calculated into the cost of the procedure (which alone averages $700). Since its founding in 2014, the Midwest Access Coalition has served more than 215 people from 14 states and has never turned away a request.

Vicki (a pseudonym), who lives in one of these more restrictive states, already had three children when she became pregnant again. She took a bus, then a train, then another bus to Chicago to get an abortion with the help of the coalition. She left her two eldest, ages 6 and 8, at home with a caretaker and brought her 2-year-old. Her host was Kate Barutha, a bubbly, white, 29-year-old arts administrator who decided to volunteer as a host after the 2016 election.

Vicki had beautiful long black hair, Barutha recalls, which swayed as she spoke about her struggle with her decision. Vicki talked about life, death, heaven and hell, and whether this was the right decision for her family. She spoke of her plans to continue her education while providing for three children. The decision of whether to terminate a pregnancy is rarely taken lightly. Women often choose to do so based on underemployment, a lack of housing or a lack of familial support.

Vicki did decide to terminate her pregnancy. As she recuperated at Barutha’s house, her 2-year-old warmed up to Barutha and delighted in seeing the hundreds of planes that fly through the Chicago skies every day. Over text messages and meals, Barutha and Vicki talked about what the future would hold.

“She seemed to be alone in life,” says Barutha. “She texted me all the way back home.” All of the hosts have training in difficult conversations and can call a volunteer emotional support helper for backup. Malone and Barutha find their guests appreciate just being near a supportive person. Too often clients are on their own, either literally or emotionally.

The Midwest Access Coalition rotates hosts to avoid burnout, knowing that it’s a big commitment to open one’s home to a stranger once a month for up to four nights. But Malone and Barutha clearly thrive on the work. Barutha speaks of the importance of bodily autonomy. Malone talks about how a racist and patriarchal medical system often makes decisions for women (and especially women of color) without consulting them. This work of making abortion a real option is one way she combats those forces.

Midwest Access Coalition’s founder, Leah Greenblum, says she “envisions a world where people can access abortion on demand regardless of race, class and geography.”

“Until that world arrives,” she says, “the Midwest Access Coalition’s work is necessary.”

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Veronica Arreola is a feminist who works on diversity in science issues at the University of Illinois at Chicago. She writes on reproductive justice, pop culture and politics at Bitch Media, where she serves on the board of directors.

You used religious language. You erred also in assuming I'm anti-abortion. I haven't made up my mind and I am very interested in learning the ethical reasoning both for and against. However, I get a deeper and less insulting level of debate from the anti-abortion brigade. Can you describe the reasons why you support abortion and what limits you would place on it?

Posted by srh1965 on 2018-02-04 02:16:21

I am not religious. I was just commenting on the typical antiabortion b.s. uttered by you. But perhaps I erred in assuming you were one of those asswipes.

Each situation is different. But women have the right to decide the outcome of their pregnancies. As it should be. BTW, no one is required to convince you of anything. Just who in the hell do you think you are, anyway?

Posted by John Ammons on 2018-02-01 19:56:11

And? Who are you to impose your goddamn morality on others?

Posted by John Ammons on 2018-02-01 19:54:19

Cite one existing law stating abortion is murder. You cannot. See, people like you are nothing but inflammatory, frustrated sickos.

Posted by John Ammons on 2018-02-01 19:53:50

So basically, srh, you have no coherent response, do you? Then you should take this piece of advice: Don't say anything unless it improves the silence. You're welcome.

Posted by DAngelo136 on 2018-01-17 00:41:06

What are most salient in your replies are their defensiveness masked with aggression, along with an unwillingness to discuss the reasoning and moral philosophy behind the abortion debate. I'm not a US resident, so that law is not relevant. My questions still stand: why then? What gives a human the right to life? You don't appear to have any interest in asking yourself why you believe what you do. Instead you are relying on dogma nearly as fixed as the religious texts of the religious anti-abortionists.

Posted by srh1965 on 2018-01-16 13:59:45

Pay attention to this passage: " (a) For the stage prior to approximately the end of the first trimester, the abortion decision and its effectuation must be left to the medical judgment of the pregnant woman's attending physician." So in other words, for the first 90 days of pregnancy, it's none of your business nor the state's. After that, it's still none of YOUR business, but the state does have standing. So in any event, it's still none of your business.

Posted by DAngelo136 on 2018-01-16 12:08:24

In my debates over the last few months online regarding the abortion issue in which I, as a secular humanist with no fixed view on this who wants to know more, I've noticed how much more aggressive, discourteous and closed-minded are one particular group: the pro-abortion advocates.

"actual, living, breathing children": Is the ability to breathe what makes us human with the legal right to life? What then for people on respirators?

Fractal's view should, I would have thought, horrify anyone who cares for the future of humanity. He or she is advocating infanticide.

My question is still this: when do humans become human with the right to life guaranteed under domestic and international laws? Why then? What are the legal and societal consequences?

Posted by srh1965 on 2018-01-16 06:22:50

That covers actual, living, breathing children. Not fetuses. Again, just because YOU think it's a child doesn't mean it is one, nor does it give you standing to unilaterally decide for other people what they should do with their body. Roe v.Wade was very clear, after the first trimester, the fetus is clearly considered a life and protected by the Constitution. Before that, that's a matter of privacy. Something you absolute moralists can't seem to wrap your collective heads around. Let me simplify it for you: It's none of your damn business.

Posted by DAngelo136 on 2018-01-16 03:43:52

I find your comment both scientifically incorrect and frightening in its callousness. What would you say, then, to a woman grieving over her lost child? "Just get over it woman, it was only a Rorschach blot." The Rorschach test, as you should know, has long been discredited as a psychological test.

I hope that other pro-choice activists can do a lot better than you in convincing me, an atheist, as to the worth of the cause. Your view is bordering on the psychopathological.

Posted by srh1965 on 2018-01-14 04:44:30

All this angst about an embryo, which couldn't care less, either way.And no sympathy or support for the woman, who in her gut KNOWS this isn't the right time to reproduce...Let's put the focus back on the woman in the picture, and her right to control her life and body; get the focus off the non-sentient entity who probably isn't much bigger than a sesame seed.

Posted by fractal on 2018-01-14 03:10:37

First of all---Don't expect any law concerning reproduction to "make sense".It quickly devolves into an emotional and religious exercise in forcing others to do as you wish.

Second of all---Don't expect emotions to "make sense" on a rational level.They don't. They are largely driven by hormones effecting body chemistry combined with the attitudes of the host person.If someone is already neurotic, or if they feel cultural pressure to experience miscarriage as an "emotional loss that lasts a lifetime"---well, that is their feelings that they are responsible for.

Has nothing to do with science or logic, and is nothing to base a law on.

There have been all sorts of cultures who don't choose birth as the point of no return for human rights. Currently, the scientific reason for this would be that act of EXPERIENCING (and having something relevant to experience) finish wiring up the nervous system of a newborn, and within a few weeks or months of birth, they are becoming sentient, though not possessing self-reflective consciousness yet.

Personally, I don't agree that all newly birthed babies should be granted personhood and saved. I have worked in hospitals and with profoundly handicapped people.I think there are times it is kinder to recycle a poorly functional body/mind early on, and let the "fetal soul" try again, if it wishes.

And you would find there are less abortions, if it were done that way.Many people get abortions because they cannot handle the thought of raising a child with severe handicaps. The testing is often unclear as to how severe the handicaps are, and if perspective parents knew they had a way out after birth---a few months for the specialists and reality to weigh in---they would be more likely to wait and see.And often bond with the infant in the meantime.

The thing is, though---All your arguments are really technicalities.Get real.That isn't what is at the bottom of your emotional reaction to abortion.Think about it.What REALLY bothers you?Isn't it about your own anxiety concerning death?

Posted by fractal on 2018-01-14 03:03:30

People tend to project their own hopes, fears, feelings of vulnerability and lost innocence etc... onto entities that cannot object to, or refute those displaced emotions.

Such is so with the fetus.The fetus itself has no personal investment in its own life or existence. Fetus does not care; mostly, fetus sleeps.Its worth is determined by the feelings of the persons involved with the pregnancy.The fetus is essentially a Rorschach blot, when discussing its "worth".

Rationally, a miscarriage is regretful in that a woman invested time and physical energy into a doomed project.

However, it is NOT society's responsibility to do anything when someone projects their own feelings onto embryos, and then demands that all others adopt their own neurotic projections.

Posted by fractal on 2018-01-14 02:38:50

If the unborn foetus has any status at all, then it is society's responsibility to make some laws regarding it. If it has none, then a miscarriage is nothing much to get upset about, for example.

Posted by srh1965 on 2018-01-13 09:08:44

Well, that is pretty clear - about your opinion.

My question about personhood relates directly to the right to life guaranteed in the USA and the UK under the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child and the UN Universal Declaration of Human Rights 1948. I'm not questioning it from a semantic perspective.

Why choose the point of birth for the gaining of these rights, as there is no large change in the physical state of the human body at that particular point apart from beginning to breathe unaided and to no longer take in nutrients via the umbilicus? This is the crux of the matter for me: I know that this question is extremely hard to answer from points of view other than the extremes of either Roman Catholicism or full abortion rights.

If what you wrote is true, why is it still an offence in the UK and the USA to assault a woman and cause a miscarriage, as separate offences? Surely, if the foetus has no separate existence, then the assault charge should stand alone.

Similarly, if there is so little significance to any unborn foetus, why do women suffering a miscarriage feel emotional loss than can last a lifetime?

Many disabled children, or even adults, have less sentience than some animals. Are you suggesting they can be euthanased or that disabled people should possess fewer rights than the rest of us?

Posted by srh1965 on 2018-01-13 09:07:10

A fetus becomes a person when it is born.

A fetus is not a person, not biologically and not linguistically.The term "person" is rooted in the word "persona".Definition: The mask of personality.

The fetus doesn't have a personality.It has no psychological individuality.It doesn't have an opinion about its own state of being.It has no established life trajectory, no self-reflective consciousness.No framework to interpret concepts and no language to communicate.

Mostly, a fetus sleeps.The neuro-circuits of a fetus don't complete its wiring until it has some experiences---largely after birth.Which is why preemies feel pain that the same age fetus does not---the preemie has been wired up earlier than usual.

A fetal fawn has WAY MORE sentience two weeks before birth, than a human baby has at age 2 months.

Ergo, a fetus is neither a child nor a person.

Posted by fractal on 2018-01-12 17:35:43

Wear a condom, dumbass.

Posted by fractal on 2018-01-12 17:28:17

Don't like abortion?DON'T HAVE ONE.

Personally,I think abortion is a highly responsible choice, and I think you are a judgmental twit.

Posted by fractal on 2018-01-12 17:27:19

When is "it" a child?

I'm an atheist. I do not believe in the sanctity of any life. However, the callous attitude of many pro-abortion rights activists chills me. Just when does "it" become a child with the right to life guaranteed under the UN's Universal Declaration of Human Rights from 1948?

Once "it" becomes a child, "it" also becomes the business of society, in conjunction with the mother. There are two people's rights to balance.

Posted by srh1965 on 2018-01-03 14:35:23

Morality and legality are not the same.

Posted by srh1965 on 2018-01-03 14:32:17

It's not a child. And just because YOU think it is, doesn't give you standing to decide unilaterally for someone else what their reproductive decisions should be. Mind your own business.

Posted by DAngelo136 on 2018-01-02 07:29:00

Abortion is a legal medical procedure. Get a dictionary.

Posted by Leyla1001nights on 2018-01-01 22:18:12

Being an accessory to the murder of a pre-born child is not an act of generosiy or heroism. Neither is it admirable.